


The Love Actually Moment

by Berty



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Falling In Love, Friends With Benefits, Friendship/Love, M/M, Minor Mary Morstan/John Watson, Past Infidelity
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-11
Updated: 2017-05-11
Packaged: 2018-10-30 19:05:25
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,209
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10883064
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Berty/pseuds/Berty
Summary: What if love doesn’t look like love? Does that mean it isn’t there? That it doesn’t exist? Is absence of evidence the same as evidence of absence?





	The Love Actually Moment

**Author's Note:**

> With about a billion thanks to Saladscream who took on the battle of the past perfect with me and emerged victorious! Any remaining errors are mine because I just couldn't leave it alone. This is only my third posted Sherlock fic, so she was doubly brave to take it on. 
> 
> Nothing to do with the film of similar name - just what I called John's epiphany while I was writing it.

It is supposed to be a drink in honour of John’s birthday, but things have kept cropping up, as they are wont to do around Sherlock Holmes, and it’s some weeks later when John finds himself welcoming their mismatched little bunch into the sitting room at Baker Street. Molly’s nervous laugh is punctuating everything, Greg is looking cheerful yet slightly bemused, Mrs Hudson has cornered Mike with stories of her tricky hip and no one is surprised when Mycroft sends along a bottle of ridiculously expensive port with his apologies. They’ve already partaken of a healthy three quarters of it by nine o’clock.

 

The windows are propped open so the unseasonably warm September air can circulate, bringing with it the smell of summer nights in London, cooling tarmac, cooking smells from a range of world cuisines, car exhaust and always, always the bland, flat scent of the Thames even this far from Embankment.

 

Sherlock is tinkering in the kitchen with something that he has promised them has no chance of becoming toxic and/or airborne. He was less clear on the flammability issue but it’s an expression of what good friends they have that no one thinks it odd that Sherlock carries on with his experiments while they are celebrating John’s birthday together – however belated it is. John has made sure that he’s taken a chair that lets him keep an eye on the lanky git, making certain he’s involved and doesn’t disappear off into his own head. But Sherlock’s even joining in from the kitchen table in his unconventional way, adding cutting observations and muttering about how stupid people are. That’s positively genial for Sherlock.

 

John’s feeling relaxed and grateful for the people around him. Sherlock, no longer dead, is back home where he belongs, and they’ve both decided that ignoring ‘it’ ever happened is the best policy to repair their trust in each other. Fragile it may be, but it’s still only been nine months and the understanding seems to be working for them for now.

 

Greg has just closed a high-profile case successfully (and without Sherlock’s assistance this time, which he adds to the end of every sentence he utters about the bloody thing) and Molly seems to have moved on from her all-consuming crush (on Sherlock). Even Mrs Hudson seems to have forgiven John for his behaviour while Sherlock was away. He wonders, not for the first time, at just how the world’s most anti-social man has such a pivotal role in so many other people’s lives. But right now, as far as John’s unconventional life ever is concerned, all is well.

 

So he really shouldn’t be surprised when the next cloud rolls in to rain on his parade.

 

“John, you’re not seeing anyone at the moment, are you?”

 

The deliberate way in which Sherlock completely fails to look up at John is worse than having the weight of his piercing stare upon him. He swears he can feel Sherlock holding his breath.

 

Turning to Molly, John twists a smile onto his unwilling lips. “As if!” He rolls his eyes at her in commiseration - being single is something they have in common more often than they’d like. They even joke about it sometimes, but it’s a bittersweet humour. Of course, it’s not the only thing they’ve had in common, for all that Molly seemed to wear her devotion to Sherlock with less artifice and more fatalism than John does.

 

“Then I have the perfect woman for you!” Molly announces, her eyes warm and pleased.

 

“What? Short-sighted and desperate?” Greg snorts, all charm and approachability off the back of his success. He doesn’t know it yet, but he’s definitely not getting any more of John’s port.

 

“Perfect _woman_?” Mrs Hudson scoffs and John hopes he’s the only one who’s noticed her emphasis.

 

Only Mike has John’s back, it would seem. “Lucky man!” he says and raises his glass.

 

“She’s lovely,” Molly continues undeterred, pink and pretty now she’s warming to her topic. “She works in Admin, she’s smart and gorgeous, early thirties, no kids. I’ve told her about you in passing and she seems interested.”

 

“I guess that’s down to what you told her. So how much _does_ John owe you?” Greg adds. The man is an endless fount of wit.

 

“Thanks, but I’m too old for blind dates!” John laughs, getting to his feet to make sure everyone’s glasses are full.

 

“No blind dates!” Molly counters, annoyingly persistent. “A group of us at the pub on Saturday evening, just friends out for a drink. You can meet her without any pressure and see if you click. Mike’s coming already, so you’ll have someone to talk to if it doesn’t work out.”

 

“Oh, that’s this Saturday is it?” asks Mike. “Wait, are you talking about Elaine?”

 

Molly nods and smiles proudly, as if she’d created the mysterious Elaine herself.

 

“Oh, she’s nice,” Mike confirms. “You’ll like her.”

 

“Well if she’s that great, I might come along myself,” Greg interrupts with a shrug, and on cue Mrs Hudson makes sorrowful cooing noises about the state of the Lestrade marriage, drawing him and Mike into a quiet conversation about how hard it is to be married.

 

“Come on, John,” Molly presses, turning to him, all hope and kindness. “What have you got to lose?”

 

John tells himself he won’t look up at Sherlock, but when he does (of course he does) Sherlock’s eyes are already sliding away from his, back to the microscope in front of him.

 

He feels an aching, yawning vertigo that is becoming familiar. John likens it to stepping onto a stair that isn’t there. It’s a shock, it’s a betrayal of what he believes and it makes his stomach swoop unpleasantly. Not even here, in the safety of Baker Street with their closest friends will Sherlock acknowledge them.

 

And Molly has a very good point. What _does_ John Watson have to lose?

 

***

 

It began about six months into sharing the flat but became a habit after Moriarty’s stunt at the pool. John likes to pretend that he can’t remember who made the first move, but that’s all it is. Pretend.

 

An argument about Sarah was the flash point. John thought she’d been pretty game about the whole ‘getting used as a hostage’ thing – not many first date girlfriends would have put up with that kind of crap and come back for more. Sherlock called her a liability and lectured on and on about how sentiment was a luxury that people like them couldn’t afford.

 

John reminded Sherlock that he had invited himself along on their bloody date in the first place, and had therefore been the one to involve the poor woman. It deteriorated from there and John lost his temper just a little bit and found himself backing Sherlock up against the bathroom door with his hands fisted in his collar. In an uncharacteristic tell, which still surprises John to this day, Sherlock locked eyes with him, licked his own lips and then glanced at John’s for a seemingly endless second.

 

And John kissed him instead of punching him.

 

Sherlock grabbed his head and kissed him back with more passion than John imagined him having in his entire body. There were desperate, grabbing hands, shoving and pushing and the sweetest friction John had ever known which culminated in a spectacular orgasm each, two pairs of ruined trousers and a tense silence that lasted a couple of days before things slowly slipped back into what they laughingly called ‘normal’.

 

It happened a few more times after that, once instigated by John and twice, and rather cleverly, by Sherlock himself. It has never been discussed. Even when John just clears his throat, Sherlock seems to know that he is thinking about mentioning it and sends him a warning glare, leaving him in no doubt that his views on the matter are unwelcome and would probably result in it never happening again.

 

And then Moriarty drugged John and kidnapped him and turned him into an IED.

 

All bets were off after that.

 

John endured terrible nightmares in the following weeks and Sherlock made no bones about helping John through that by being in his bed whenever he woke in a panic, in tears or shaking apart. On occasion he didn’t even wait for the excuse of a nightmare and simply followed John to his room at night. John would watch him strip efficiently and unashamedly, then slide across to make room for him without comment.

 

It was a period of their lives together that defied words and was sparse on eye contact.

 

Then Sherlock died.

 

John wonders if he will ever be able to forgive him for that.

 

Then Sherlock returned.

 

And John doesn’t need to wonder about that one at all.

 

***

 

If their arrangement has been without discussion before, now it is mostly conducted without any words at all. John tells himself that he likes it that way – he knows that if he started to explain what is within him, he would never be able to stop. So they only whisper curses and pleases when there seems no other choice.

 

They’ve fucked their way through John’s failed engagement, through him moving back into Baker Street and through Sherlock’s return to grace in the eyes of the British public.

 

They are clearly not boyfriends, John thinks. As if Sherlock would allow himself to be anything quite so mundane. Friends with benefits is too casual. Anything else is too coarse. In fact, John doubts there is a word that will encompass their platonic love of each other’s company and the fact that they enjoy an extremely healthy sex life.

 

What surprises John the most is how simple it has been to continue in the way they always have – the bickering, the laughter, the sarcasm and the comfortable ease in their shared habits. It’s rare that John slips and crosses the invisible line between friends and… whatever it is they are now. He is careful, guarded, knowing the cost of a misstep might be everything he has.

 

So John has a life with Sherlock – days filled with one kind of feeling and their nights filled with another. The two are separated by a void of silence and awkwardness that John thought he could ignore. Recently, however, he’s begun to miss all the things they aren’t more than he loves the things that they are. Crave is not too strong a word for the feelings that he wakes with sometimes. Alone. In the mornings he always wakes alone. He gets up, goes downstairs and becomes Sherlock’s best friend again.

 

For every hard, bitten kiss he gets, he misses an absent-minded one. For every glide of his hand on overheated, sweat-slicked skin, he longs to curve his palm against Sherlock’s nape when he’s bent over his latest experiment.

 

John feels like he has been sleepwalking, and now, suddenly awake, he finds himself a hundred miles from where he expected to be and without a map.

 

***

 

By the time John sees his guests to the door, the port is gone and so are the three bottles of wine brought as birthday gifts. He has a slightly unsteady step and an appointment to meet a ‘perfect for him’ woman that Saturday night. He should be feeling pretty great, all things considered.

 

But when he walks back into the kitchen, Sherlock has already gone – his bedroom door firmly closed. John hesitates, wanting to knock but knowing that Sherlock will instantly see through any excuse he gives for doing so. And this, right here, is exactly what he means. He doesn’t even feel comfortable enough to walk uninvited into Sherlock’s room – shouldn’t people who do what they do together be able to assume that they can? Quietly, switching off the lights as he goes, John climbs the stairs to his room. He strips, gets into bed and lays awake for several hours, but Sherlock doesn’t come up to join him.

 

***

 

It’s quiet in the flat the next morning, and John’s not too unhappy about that. Turns out that it doesn’t matter how expensive the port is, it still gives him a dirty, thumping headache. He pulls paracetamol from the bathroom cabinet and drinks three glasses of tap water to wash them down. Sherlock is already up, slouched at the desk in the sitting room. They studiously ignore each other as John passes into the kitchen where he fills the kettle and eyes the date on the loaf of bread that has been lurking in the cupboard for days. It smells odd and has some interesting green patches on it, so he bins it and wishes he hadn’t drunk all that water.

 

Sherlock is squinting at John’s laptop and only grunts when John deposits tea without toast at his elbow.

 

“Need to go shopping. Do you want anything?” John enquires, sitting on the sofa to pull on his shoes and drink his too-hot tea. He has learned that there is no point in asking Sherlock a direct question when it is even slightly personal. The impossible git will stew for a while and then he will somehow bring an innocuous and unrelated conversation around to the touchy subject as if by accident.

 

Sherlock has made it abundantly clear that he doesn’t want to discuss anything that happened last night right now and John’s not one to rock the boat, particularly when he hasn’t actually got any answers, even for his own questions yet.

 

On his return from Tesco, John finds Sherlock struggling into his jacket and barking instructions down his mobile phone. He piles the bags onto a clear-ish corner of the kitchen table.

 

“Case?” John asks when Sherlock disconnects the call with a muttered ‘idiot’.

 

“Husband and wife murder/suicide in Islington, no history of domestic disturbance, no apparent motive,” Sherlock grins. “Busy?”

 

“Well I have some highly important towels to fold, but if it’s urgent…”

 

Sherlock nods, holding his eye for a second too long, then sweeps out of the room trusting John to follow.

 

***

 

It takes sixty frantic hours to find the real murderer (“Oh, come on, it’s _obvious,_ John!”). That’s sixty hours of very little in the way of sleep, nutritious food or chances to have an unwelcome conversation, and sixty hours of coffee, running around like they aren’t the wrong side of thirty-five, and people trying to stab them with long, very, very deadly looking blades. (“He’s an accountant, John! I wasn’t exactly prepared for him to be wielding a machete!”).

 

They come home triumphant but tired and somewhat bruised and bloodied. It’s still only early evening but John is about to pass out and is not too fussy about where that happens.

 

“I’m knackered! I’m off to bed,” he yawns. “Wait, what day is it?”

 

Sherlock tips his head in thought. “Friday,” he announces eventually. His eyes dart to John’s and away again quickly, anywhere but at John.

 

“Okay,” John nods wearily and trudges toward the stairs.

 

Sherlock’s quiet voice stops him at the door. “John? The machete thing earlier? Thank you, that was… thank you.”

 

John turns, but Sherlock already has his violin bow in one hand, tightening the hairs with the other. He’s focussed on that with an intensity it really doesn’t warrant. If John hadn’t heard the words, he would never have guessed that they had been talking at all.

 

“You’re welcome. You’re always welcome,” John murmurs. He doesn’t even know if it will make sense to Sherlock, but he’s usually quite good at knowing what John means. Maybe it’s his superpower. Maybe he can use it to deduce John’s poor confused heart because John is damned if he understands it. One moment he could happily strangle Sherlock for the cold, manipulative, obtuse arse that he is and the next he wants to wrap him in a hug that he will never find a way out of.

 

It’s John’s fundamental state to be confused by Sherlock Holmes. He makes assumptions based on what a similar behaviour from himself might mean but he has no evidence that is what Sherlock means by it. He assumes that because they have sex that they are.. something, and because they make each other laugh that they are something else… something good. But maybe he is completely wrong about all of it.

 

Or maybe John just _really_ needs to go to bed.

 

He makes it to his room and falls asleep on top of the covers before he even has time to pull his shoes off.

 

***

 

Sherlock appears at around midday and immediately locks himself in the bathroom for another half hour to bathe.

 

John makes more coffee and continues to work on his blog. He’s stuck on another word for ‘genius’ he hasn’t used already and is blaming that on insufficient sleep, even though he slept a solid twelve hours last night.

 

Sherlock pours himself coffee from John’s pot and takes possession of the sofa – you can’t call what he does ‘sitting’, it’s so much more dramatic than that.

 

“So,” he begins and John’s heart sinks. He knows that brittle, artificially cheerful tone of voice. Mycroft does it too. He ignores Sherlock and tries to focus on his typing.

 

“It’s the big date tonight,” Sherlock smiles, all hard edges and cold eyes. “Elaine!” His hands steeple before his lips in an achingly familiar gesture and waits for John to bite.

 

“It’s not a date,” John replies calmly.

 

“Oh, come now, John. Surely, it is! It’s two people…”

 

“It’s eight people.”

 

“…who like each other…”

 

“I’ve never met her before.”

 

“…going out to have some fun.”

 

John rolls his neck side to side, releasing some of the tension that’s building. He doesn’t need his own words thrown back in his face from way back when, before Sherlock jumped off a bloody building and let John think he was dead! Before he took John’s definition of love and challenged it, tested it, turned it and left John wondering if this was the same thing at all.

 

“Is there a point to this?” he asks with a tight smile.

 

“Or should that be _my_ question?” Sherlock says, a slick, slippery grin on his face, there and then gone.

 

John deliberately unclenches his fingers from his laptop and lays it to the side. Apparently they are doing this and John reminds himself that Sherlock doesn’t understand social interaction terribly well. Whether that’s out of choice is another matter, of course.

 

John’s watched Sherlock do this too many times to be drawn into his play-acting and the fact that he’s doing it to John at all has him half-way to pissed off already.

 

“Do you have a problem with me going out for a drink with some friends?” he asks carefully. Now is Sherlock’s chance to say something – John’s left it wide open for him to speak his mind. It’s the closest they have ever come to a discussion of their arrangement.

 

Sherlock regards him with a narrow, calculating gaze. Finally he shrugs. “None whatsoever, John. Why would I? I’m sure the country won’t fall in the time it takes you to drink two pints, discuss the weather, Afghanistan, your alcoholic sister, ask about each other’s jobs and have a mediocre sexual experience. Fascinating stuff! What _are_ you going to tell her about your line of work then, John? Oh! That might be good! Do you think she might be a fan?”

 

“Oh, get over yourself, Sherlock!” John snaps.

 

Sherlock narrows his eyes and tips his head to one side. “Hmmm, interesting idea. You first.”

 

And maybe John deserves that – he walked right into it. That doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt like a bitch though, to hear that he means so little to the man he’s been sharing so much of his life with for so long. That Sherlock can throw John’s feelings back in his face without batting an eyelid should tell John everything he needs to know.

 

Yes, John has struggled to find his place in Sherlock’s life. The man is so self-contained and prickly, it doesn’t seem to leave a lot of room for someone like John. That’s why he was so surprised when something happened between them at all. There was next to no indication that Sherlock had any interest in sex, let alone sex with John. And John has been wrong-footed ever since, trying to make sense of it.

 

He cannot, in all honesty, say that it hadn’t crossed his mind that accepting Molly’s invitation might provoke a reaction out of Sherlock – in some ways he might have even wanted it to. Not to hurt Sherlock intentionally, but to make him acknowledge John’s existence, to make him clarify their relationship (if that’s what he thought of it as). John has been playing a game with rules that he doesn’t even know for years now and he’s exhausted.

 

Sherlock’s callous dismissal has shocked him, and John wants to push back, to hurt Sherlock as much as he himself is hurting right now. Until this moment, John realises he wasn’t actually going to go through with this evening’s meeting, no matter what he’d said. He would have found a reason not to go. Now he finds himself wanting to – what could be more soothing for his poor battered ego than to chat-up a woman who is already interested in him? John is _good_ with people, he’s a nice guy and he has a more than fifty per cent success rate when he’s set his cap at someone. Why _not_ Elaine? Why not _tonight_?

 

“Fine,” he grits quietly. His jaw is beginning to throb from clenching his teeth so long and he has the start of a headache settling over his left eye that feels like a hangover but isn't. He gets up from his chair. He has to get out of this room, out of this flat, and right now.

 

“Have fun!” Sherlock calls after him when John picks up his wallet, keys and phone, and walks down the stairs.

 

“Be careful what you wish for,” John mutters.

 

***

 

John manages to avoid Sherlock when he arrives back at the flat to change a few hours later. He’s spent the afternoon drifting around the city: Regent’s Park, the British Museum, walking along the Thames, then back to Baker Street. He’s footsore, heartsore and no closer to an answer he likes. He decides to stick with his current plan and go to the pub anyway. It’s better than letting Sherlock demonstrate how little he values their friendship again.

 

John showers quickly then pulls on a fine-knit, blue jumper and some clean jeans. He checks his wallet for cash and looks himself over in the mirror. He looks… he looks like what he is – a confused, disappointed man, not yet old, but no longer young. He wonders what Elaine will make of him. He wonders what to make of himself.

 

The pub is tucked away from the main tourist areas, but this is London and it’s Saturday night. There’s a wait at the bar to order drinks and John takes the time to watch his group where they’ve bagged a table.

 

Molly wasn’t lying when she said there was no pressure. There are eleven of them now for some convoluted reason that John didn’t bother to follow. Two of them he doesn’t have names for – one of them might be Kate? Karen? Steph is very loud and indiscreet for a medical practitioner and she sets John’s teeth on edge. There’s sensible friend Ruth and Gay Daniel (at least that’s how he was introduced and he didn’t object, so who is John to question it?) whose boyfriend has recently dumped him. Then there’s Elaine who is as nice as everyone promised. John has been talking to her for around forty minutes about her work and about his blog. She’s witty and calming, with short brunette hair and expressive eyes. She has laughed at all his jokes and put her hand on his arm several times in a way that made it seem almost natural. She’s…nice. Sexy. Interested.

 

John signals to the barman again, but is ignored.

 

Molly and her boyfriend Nathan are very cuddly. They gaze at each other at every opportunity and call each other by pet names. _Still new and naive_ , John thinks and then hates himself for it. Mike and Jill on the other hand have been married for years. They show their belonging in subtle, barely visible ways; their ease in each other’s space, the merest meeting of eyes, a small smile, a word to remind the other of a detail they have missed in the story they are telling. Both couples are in love, but the differences in the way they interact are obvious and it sets John’s overwrought mind off on a new tangent.

 

What if love isn’t a fixed point? What if it’s different things to different people? And people don’t get a whole lot more ‘different’ than Sherlock Holmes.

 

What if love doesn’t look like love? Does that mean it isn’t there? That it doesn’t exist? Is absence of evidence the same as evidence of absence?

 

“What can I get you?” the barman asks finally, bringing John back from places that are making him feel decidedly less certain than he was.

 

John repeats his order, hands over a ridiculous amount of money and accepts a dripping tray of nearly full glasses that he deposits on the table, snagging his own and Daniel’s. It gives him an excuse to move away from Steph of the shrieking laugh as he puts the pint down in front of the man in question and snags the seat next to him. It’s next to Elaine too, so it doesn’t look too odd if anyone cares enough to be watching.

 

“Here you go, Daniel. I wouldn’t recommend it as a long term plan, but drown your sorrows,” John tells him.

 

He seems like a nice guy, Daniel. He works in Cardiology diagnostics and is probably about five years younger than John. He and his Callum had been together for six years when Callum decided to move on to pastures new – younger guy, something in the media. He’d said he wasn’t getting what he needed from the relationship anymore. He’d said he’d tried. Daniel doesn’t expand on their breakup any further, but is left with a flat he can’t afford and the prospect of living alone for the first time. He’s thinking of getting a dog for company and this draws Elaine and possibly-Kate into the conversation. They discuss breeds, adopting and the best parks for dog walks.

 

That gives John another chance to sit back and watch the group, as he has nothing to add. All of them work at Bart’s or are here with someone who does. They are all professional people whose homes do not sporadically explode as a rule. Their fridges are not filled with body parts. Their flatmates do not shoot things when they are bored. They have to pay for their meals when they eat out instead of only frequenting restaurants that owe them a favour. They don’t have half of their kitchens designated for chemistry. They don’t have former exotic dancers and drug cartel bookkeepers as their landladies and their brothers are not the British Government.

 

 _God, it all sounds so unspeakably tedious,_ says Sherlock’s voice in John’s head.

 

Yes, life with Sherlock is insane. Yes, he is rude, insensitive and unpredictable. Yes, he sulks and flounces and looms. Yes, he is lazy and entitled, manipulative and a recovering addict. No, he has no concept of personal space or privacy.

 

But he’s so funny on the sly that he has John in immature giggles at the most inappropriate times. He is utterly fascinating and the deductive leaps that his mind can make leave John dizzy sometimes. He treats royalty and the homeless with the same detached demeanour and never disregards someone on the basis of where they come from. He pretends that he doesn’t care way more often than the times that he actually doesn’t care. He regularly asks John’s advice, often indirectly and he occasionally even listens to what John has to say. And an evening with him doing nothing but pick apart TV shows, drink tea and play the violin is still a hundred times more appealing to John than…well, this.

 

He needs to go.

 

As if on cue, his phone vibrates in his pocket and he pulls it out. It’s from his bank, trying to sell him life insurance, but no one needs to know that.

 

“Ah,” John says and takes a healthy swig from his beer. “I’m being summoned.” He pockets his phone and stands up, grabbing his coat.

 

“Is that His Majesty, then?” Molly asks with a rueful smile on her face.

 

“Yep. Got a case. Probably needs me to carry his magnifying glass or something crucial!” John rolls his eyes and tips back his head to down the last of his pint.

 

“Glad you could make it, John,” Mike offers.

 

“Thanks for inviting me. It was lovely to meet you all,” he replies with a wave and an extra smile for Elaine, who perks up considerably at being singled out.

 

So, he’s a flirt. He just can’t seem to help it. He tries to be nice and just doesn’t know where that line is. So why has it never worked on Sherlock Holmes?

 

***

 

The light is on in the kitchen when John gets home but the sitting room is in darkness. The weather has changed while they were working the case as the Indian summer fades away into grey autumnal days and cold nights. (John is toying with _An Incident in Islington_ or _Accountants and Accountability_ as the title for his blog entry.) It’s colder in the flat and John knows it won’t be long before they have to start lighting the fire of an evening.

 

Sherlock is noticeably absent once again and John squares his shoulders to go and knock on his bedroom door. There’s no answer and despite Sherlock regularly invading John’s privacy by entering his room when he’s absent, John was not brought up to be so rude. Besides which, if the man doesn’t want to talk, then there’s nothing John can do to change that - he’s tried it before. Sherlock’s sulks and strops are legendary and apparently unassailable.

 

John goes to the kitchen and starts to make himself some tea before he realises that he doesn’t actually want any, and he’s just going through the motions. He wonders about calling it a night, but he needs to think and he knows he’ll drop off in minutes if he’s on his bed. He pours himself a whiskey and shuns the overhead light in the sitting room for the subtler glow of the standard lamp.

 

Sitting in the dark - John’s not sure if that’s creepy, ridiculous or heart-breaking – is Sherlock, curled into the end of the sofa, his knees drawn up and his bare feet crossed. His arms are folded across his knees and he looks woebegone. And who would guess that John even knew what ‘woebegone’ was before he moved in with this bloody drama queen.

 

Sadly, this is the woebegone drama queen that he’s in love with, so John doesn’t say a word as he takes a seat in his armchair and waits for him to speak.

 

“You’re home earlier than I expected,” Sherlock muses quietly in a pensive voice when John has worked his way through his whiskey. And this could go either way, John thinks, so he says nothing.

 

Sherlock sniffs and arches his back a little before scrubbing a hand through his curls. His eyes settle on John again and narrow. “You don’t seem disappointed though. Interesting.”

 

John puts down his glass, props his elbow on the arm of his chair and rests his chin on his fist. Sherlock likes to take the high ground of cool logic instead of the ‘irrational sentimentality’ of John’s arguments. John’s had that thrown in his face more than once, so if Sherlock wants an argument tonight, he’s going to have to start it himself.

 

“You liked her. She liked you. Wasn’t that the point of the exercise? Yet here you are before eleven o’clock without having gone to her's for ‘coffee’.” Sherlock rolls his eyes, obviously too bored to point out exactly how boring that is.

 

John licks his lips a little, but doesn’t interrupt.

 

“Oh! Or are you playing a long game? Was she that _nice?_ Just your type? Worth waiting for?”

 

John would be lying if he isn’t just the tiniest bit gratified that Sherlock seems jealous – not that he’s going to say that, because he values his life. The fact that Sherlock is so scathing and unpleasant is as good as a signed affidavit that something is off in Sherlock’s view. It is always his first instinct to fight back with his smart tongue and his brilliant brain. But John wonders if Sherlock even realises that he’s doing it, let alone whether he knows why.

 

“She seemed very pleasant,” John says mildly while Sherlock’s gaze roams the room for something to fix his scowl on.

 

“Well, so did Mary,” Sherlock tosses back carelessly, then pales as his eyes snap to John and away. Then, as if he cannot help himself, back again with something like panic on his face.

 

John swallows hard, but doesn’t let the surge of pain and anger that roars out of nowhere show. He just tips his head and gazes at Sherlock with the hint of a question in his raised eyebrows.

 

Scrubbing a hand over his mouth and chin, as if to force the words back inside, Sherlock closes his eyes. “That was unforgivable, but I have to ask anyway,” he croaks, that rich, dark voice strained and raw, “Forgive me, John. I… I didn’t…I’m sorry.”

 

He stands up in a rush and stalks towards the door, choosing to leave the room rather than wait for John’s response. Sherlock _really_ hates to apologise and it’s an indication of how out of bounds he is that he is doing so now.

 

Mary is off limits and Sherlock has never needed to be told that before. The months that Sherlock was gone were the worst of John’s life. Worse than Afghanistan, worse than the rehabilitation, worse somehow than his parents’ deaths. John was utterly lost, unable to find a reason to gather the broken pieces of himself together again. If he’d been less of a coward he would have ended his misery with a bullet, but instead of dying he just chose not to live. A passive path to his own death – John thought that rather fitting at the time.

 

Mary probably saved his life. Spunky, inappropriate and unshakeable, Mary Morstan didn’t treat John like he was broken. It was as if she had been the only one who had looked past the grief and guilt and loneliness and seen something of worth. She didn’t want to fix him, but somehow that was what it had taken. She never asked more of him than he could give, so he gave her everything he had left. He had asked her to marry him only hours before Sherlock revealed his deception – they had been out celebrating when he staged his big return.

 

Their engagement limped on for only a few months after that. It was not as if anything could compete with Sherlock Holmes, but Mary didn’t even try. She smiled and endured it when John careened between ignoring Sherlock completely and spending every waking hour with him as he tried to work out his conflicting emotions. She just nodded at his poor excuses when he hadn’t come home at night and accepted his guilty kisses when he still had the scent of Sherlock on his skin the morning after.

 

John had never seen himself as the kind of man who cheated. He’d always imagined that he would take the harder, more moral path of choosing rather than lying had the situation ever arisen. But it had been so easy with Sherlock – he hadn’t even considered it as an infidelity. It was _Sherlock_ – John could no more deny him than he could deny his lungs breath or his heart the blood to pump.

 

There was no fight, no screaming matches over the division of shared items from the house that had never really been their home. Mary never asked John to choose between them, but withdrew from the field with dignity and a rueful smile, almost eerily calm.

 

In some ways that had been even worse because it had underlined how clear it was to everyone else on this planet that John Watson belonged with Sherlock Holmes – all of him, not just the parts he chose to give to John.

 

The only person who didn’t know it was the world’s only consulting detective, it seemed. Like he ignored the Earth orbiting the Sun, he ignored that John orbited him, trapped there with a gravity too great to escape.

 

John would have married her, too. He would have gone through with it. She was a good woman and it hadn’t been her fault that John had already found the love of his life before he’d met her. He treated her badly; he knew that. He owes her and he always will. The guilt of it has a habit of finding him at odd times, choking him with how much he hates himself for treating her that way.

 

But he can’t think about that now. He would like to say that he has a plan for how this will go, but he can’t.

 

“Why don’t you just ask?” John says to Sherlock’s retreating back. He rubs a thumbnail against the grain of the armchair fabric and watches the pattern it makes.

 

From the corner of his eye he sees the tall man stop. John can feel the tension vibrating off him from here. Sherlock seems trapped. He makes no move to leave the room and he won’t turn to meet John’s gaze.

 

John crosses his legs and leans back into his chair. The whiskey on top of his couple of pints at the pub is making him loose and bold.

 

“Why do you _never…_ just… ask? We could do that, you know, act like adults. Talk about things. I’ve heard it’s not known to be fatal.”

 

Sherlock relaxes the tiniest bit – enough to jerkily shrug a shoulder in a clear rebuttal of John’s assertions.

 

John smiles sadly down into his lap but not even Sherlock’s dry attempts at wit can derail what’s happening here. Something is going to change tonight and John simply cannot see which way it will fall.

 

There are so many variables here, not even Sherlock would be able to predict this outcome. Is Sherlock really so detached from his feelings that he doesn’t know that this isn’t how it usually works? Surely he must know that John craves the only thing he’s not getting from their life together? Does that mean he is unwilling to give it – that he doesn’t have it to give? Is John really going to make this the deal breaker for them? Can he not be happy with the way things are? Do the compromises he makes outweigh the benefits he enjoys?

 

Doubt is not something that John often suffers from or worries about. He trusts his instincts every day whether making a shot or prescribing antibiotics, so why has this uncertainty over his relationship with his best friend thrown him for a loop? Sometimes he cannot doubt that he is in the right place and that Sherlock’s side is where he needs to be. Yet at other times he feels that he barely knows the man at all. He feels _lonely._ His insecurities crowd him and make him question Sherlock’s motivations. God knows, the man doesn’t do anything without a reason, so what is his reason for fucking John? Is it boredom? Is it his own need? Is it to keep John close by? Is it because he thinks that is what John wants rather than something he wants for himself? John forces down the taste of bile at that thought.

 

It is _that_ uncertainty that has brought them here.

 

Sherlock’s head drops back and he stares at the ceiling. “I do _see_ , John. I see that I’m not… that what we are is…less than you might want.”

 

“How would you know what I want?” John asks with a calmness he didn’t know he had. “You never asked.”

 

“Alright, it’s less than you deserve and if I were a better man then I would be happy for you. I would want that for you; Elaine or Sarah or …”

 

“But?”

 

“I’m not a better man,” Sherlock states, quite baldly. “I’m a selfish man. I’m a man who would rather watch you suffer with me than be happy with someone else. Don’t tell me this comes as a surprise to you now, considering all I have made you endure.”

 

“Suffer is rather a strong word,” John murmurs but Sherlock is still talking to the ceiling, still won’t look at him.

 

“You need more, and although I can’t say I understand it, I know you deserve it. You, in return, must see that you’re important to me and I… I would give it to you, if I understood it… if I had it.”

 

John breathes deeply and purses his lips, trying to stop the wave of dread that batters at him. “You’re blowing this out of all proportion, you know.”

 

“Am I?” Sherlock turns and steps closer to John’s chair. He appears oddly young in his t-shirt and pyjama bottoms. He looks down at John now, his eyes soft and regretful. “You’ve just been out to meet a woman, one you have been led to believe was suitable for you, one who has expressed an interest in you which most likely involves sex. Part of your reason for going was that this would force a reaction from me, to bring what you perceive as an impasse to a head, and another was because you genuinely miss the gestures and words that I’m not providing you with. I don’t do _sentiment_ , John. You know that!”

 

“Yes, but _I_ don’t do mind-reading, Sherlock!” John throws back harshly. He turns his head for a moment and gathers his patience again. “There’s a difference between the hearts and flowers you’re imagining and… and the things I’m looking for.”

 

Sherlock takes another step forward. “Which are?” He looks sceptical but intrigued. And dear god, he genuinely doesn’t know.

 

“The things that fill the gaps between friendship and lust.”

 

Sherlock’s eyes shine a little in the dim light as he shrugs helplessly; his hands open in a silent plea for understanding.

 

“I want to sleep in with you on rainy Sundays,” John says hoarsely and has to clear his throat. “I want to put my hand in your hair for no other reason than that I enjoy it. I want to leave notes on the kitchen table when I have to go out without you. I want to kiss you wherever and whenever I feel like it. I want cuddles with the crap TV shows and smiles over breakfast. I want you in my bed every night, even if it’s just to sleep. And I want you to still be there when I wake up in the morning. I want your name as my ‘In case of emergency’. _Love_ , Sherlock. Love is not a dirty word.”

 

Sherlock takes a breath and opens his mouth to speak, but changes his mind and closes his eyes.

 

It’s not often that Sherlock Holmes is lost for words, so John takes advantage of it. “I know you say it’s a chemical defect and a societal construct but it’s important nonetheless. It lets people know they are cared for, wanted, accepted – all things you claim to have no use for.”

 

“John,” and his voice is rough like gravel and bleak like a rainy November night. “I don’t know _how_ …”

 

“Then learn! It’s like anything else you set your mind to, Sherlock. You learn what it looks like and you mimic it – I know you know how to do that.”

 

“And I would mimic who? You?”

 

“Yep,” John smiles a little bit and lifts his chin, challenging Sherlock to counter him. This isn’t the time for anything half-arsed he realises.

 

“Because you’re…”

 

“In love with you, yes. And rather good at it, considering that I’m still here at all.”

 

Sherlock regards him, blinking slowly and John reminds himself to keep breathing. “So you show me the kinds of affection you desire and I copy them.”

 

“Yes.”

 

“And it doesn’t bother you that I would have to learn this? Have to go against my nature to learn to show that I love you?”

 

“Nope.” If Sherlock hasn’t dismissed it out of hand already, if he’s wrapping that massive intellect around John’s words, then maybe he has a chance.

 

“But all it would be is an act, John…” Sherlock says softly. It sounds almost regretful.

 

“At first, yes, maybe,” John agrees quickly. He turns in his chair to see Sherlock’s face more clearly. “But isn’t that how we learn everything in the beginning? How to smile? How to talk? How to adapt our behaviours to our environment? We hypothesise, test and modify and when we find something that works, something that gets the desired result, we do it again. It becomes instinctive. It becomes natural – we do it without thinking. Don’t tell me the world’s only consulting detective and humble genius doesn’t know how to do something so simple a child can do it.”

 

Sherlock smiles, tired and fond. “Behaviour therapy, John? Social cognitive theory? Are you really using psychology to talk me into falling in love with you?”

 

“No, you idiot! You’re already in love with me, or we wouldn’t be having this conversation. I’m using psychology to prove it.”

 

“To you?’

 

“No, Sherlock, to _you!”_

 

“That’s rid… Wait. I’m already in love with you?”

 

“Yeah, of course. Of course you are. You probably don’t think of it that way, and god knows it doesn’t look like any kind of love I’ve ever seen before either, but the more I think about it, the more certain I am. That’s why I’m here, you see, not having a euphemistic coffee with whoever.” John shrugs. “You love me. You behave differently with me compared to any other person I’ve seen you with. You make allowances for me, you compromise, you modify your behaviour, you consider my welfare, you occasionally even put it before your own.”

 

Sherlock seems to consider this new information and doesn’t shoot it to pieces immediately. He tips his head and frowns down at John. “So, why the ‘date’?”

 

“I didn’t say _I_ was a genius, Sherlock. What I said was that yours doesn’t look like any kind of love I’ve seen before! I had my head stuck up my arse and I felt …uncertain of your… so I thought…”

 

They are silent for a long moment. Sherlock stares at John as if he is a particularly difficult sample of mould to classify. John stares at Sherlock because he knows his fate is still hanging by a thread here. Being scrutinised by Sherlock is as terrifying as you’d imagine and John has newfound respect for anyone on the receiving end of it regardless of their guilt or innocence.

 

“Your recent behaviour shows that you aren’t thrilled by my interest in pursuing sexual relationships with others,” John ventures.

 

Sherlock waves a dismissive hand and rolls his eyes. “That could just be my selfish desire to keep you for my own purposes. That doesn’t mean it is love that is motivating me.”

 

“No, I get that, but by agreeing to try my idea, you can evaluate whether or not it is worth it to you to indulge me in this. What have you got to lose?”

 

“And if I decide…”

 

“You won’t.”

 

“But if it goes against…”

 

“It won’t.”

 

Sherlock eyes him warily. He’s taking a chance on John, making himself vulnerable to another human being. John can almost see the doubts flicker behind Sherlock’s gaze. “You’re that sure?”

 

“That I love you? That you love me?” John’s shoulders square, he lifts his chin and purses his lips. But he cannot keep in the smile that breaks across his face. “Yeah, I am.”

 

“Then I agree in principle. We should re-evaluate after twenty-eight days to discuss findings and progress and any adjustments that need to be made should we agree to proceed. Is that acceptable?”

 

John nods his head.

 

Obviously uncomfortable, Sherlock’s eyes slide away, and he contemplates the carpet. “John, I suspect one of your criteria will be demonstrative behaviour in public, but I think it best if we…”

 

“We won’t let on to people we know, Sherlock.”

 

“The questions, should we decide not to pursue this further after the twenty-eight days might be uncomfortable for both of us.”

 

“I agree,” John says, more determined than ever that he couldn’t mess this up. “Any other terms?”

 

“No poetry,” Sherlock scowls immediately.

 

John gives a bark of surprised laughter and delights at the smirk on Sherlock’s face. “No poetry, fine.”

 

“Fine.”

 

“Fine.”

 

“Good.”

 

“Good.”

 

“Goodnight, then,” Sherlock says as he turns on his heel and marches out of the sitting room.

 

His face when he finds John in his bed after he finishes in the bathroom is priceless, even though John’s bravado isn’t quite as resilient as he’s pretending.

 

“Is this okay, then?” John asks. He did consider taking it slowly, but they’ve had sex many times and it felt silly to ignore that. Sherlock is a ridiculously quick study, resourceful and good at incorporating new data into existing schemas. “I do only have twenty-eight days to prove my theory, after all.”

 

Also, John couldn’t wait to begin.

 

Sherlock blinks, and his lips twitch up at the corner, but he nods eventually and gets into bed in his pyjamas.

 

John switches off the lamp on his side of the bed and bends over Sherlock who is lying flat on his back looking about as uncomfortable as he possibly can.

 

“Goodnight,” John says and kisses Sherlock softly but invitingly should he choose to take it that way. He settles himself on his side next to the lanky idiot who is still lying as stiff as a board, which is ironic as his habitual posture when he’s at home can best be described as _draped._

 

It takes Sherlock about four minutes to roll and incrementally slide himself closer to John, who has his eyes shut and is breathing rhythmically and deeply. Obviously it won’t fool Sherlock into thinking he’s asleep, but that’s not the point here.

 

His arse eases into John’s groin with such cautiousness that John can’t help the smile that breaks spontaneously across his face. This is one of John’s own favourite sleeping positions – his lips against Sherlock’s spine, Sherlock’s arse snug against his cock and their thighs pressed tight together. John slings a heavy arm across Sherlock and begins to rub idle circles on his belly, his fingers working beneath the soft material of his t-shirt easily.

John hums contentedly, sweeping his hand lower, skimming along the waistband of Sherlock’s pyjama bottoms and dipping below.

 

Sherlock swallows loud enough for John to hear – that could be his fingers, but it’s more likely that he’s just realised that John has come to bed naked and that he really, really likes stroking Sherlock’s belly.

 

John’s cock is slowly coming to full hardness against Sherlock’s cleft, hot and solid where he cannot fail to feel it most intensely.

 

Sherlock tips back his head, careful not to catch John and lets out a long, satisfied sigh. John is thrilled that he’s learning already, so he rewards him with his hand in his pyjamas and a palm around his wanting cock, already hard and silky smooth. Sherlock shudders when John rubs a slow and ungentle thumb across the circumcised head of his length.

 

John is hard and leaking against Sherlock, trapped along his cleft and nudging against his balls when he gently rocks his hips. The drag of material against his skin is just pushing him higher and he’s soaking Sherlock’s pyjamas with his eagerness.

 

Sherlock too is already breathing harshly, his gasps catching in his throat when John’s fist catches that spot just below the head that makes him shake.

 

He could stop and get some lube, or at least lick his palm, but that would mean him having to take his hands off Sherlock and John can’t bear to. He has worked his other hand into the curls at the nape of Sherlock’s neck and nudged his t-shirt up enough to mouth against the knobs of his spine.

 

He gathers the drops of slick that well from Sherlock’s slit and smears them all around the head of his cock, relishing the twitches and sighs and how it encourages him to drool even more.

 

John is riding the warmth between Sherlock’s legs, his dick a delicious buzzing ache. He slides his thumb to the spot just below the crown that always makes Sherlock shiver. Sherlock is almost whimpering, so softly it sounds like it is painful to keep it in. John’s heard those sounds before but their tacit rules haven’t allowed him to ask for more.

 

Those rules don’t apply anymore.

 

“Come on, love. Come on,” John murmurs into Sherlock’s skin. “Tell me.”

 

For a second John thinks he’s pushed too far, too fast. Sherlock doesn’t even breathe for long moment.

 

“It’s good,” he whispers finally, then groans as John speeds his hand, squeezing just right. “It’s so…God! So good, John!”

 

John doesn’t know when his heart has ever felt so full. It’s overwhelming. It’s perfectly them and he knows that he’s not alone in this realisation when Sherlock stiffens, moans and pulses into John’s fist.

 

Sherlock is still coming when John rolls him onto his back and slides up to kiss his gasping mouth. It only takes three pulls on his own cock for John to be adding his own come to the mess they have made of Sherlock’s pyjama pants.

 

It seems to take an age for their breathing to even out. As weary as he is, John knows that Sherlock will be uncomfortable in his soaking pyjamas, so he drags himself off Sherlock’s chest and struggles him out of the ruined clothing. He wipes them both down with it and then throws it into the corner. John pulls up the blankets over them and settles into the gap he left, tight against Sherlock’s side, their legs tangled between each other’s and his arm slung across Sherlock’s waist.

 

“I saw the weather earlier,” John tells Sherlock’s shoulder but only gets a disgusted grunt in return. “Supposed to rain tonight.”

 

Sherlock doesn’t even bother to acknowledge this.

 

“So that would make it a rainy Sunday morning…” John trails off.

 

Sherlock goes stiller even than before and then, slowly, deliberately he curls an arm around John’s shoulder, whispers an amused, “Idiot,” into John’s hair and breathes them both down into sleep.

 

Fin


End file.
